Angered by Filibusters on Nominees, Republicans Stage Their Own Protest

The Senate on Wednesday began an extraordinary 30-hour through-the-night session initiated by Republicans to dramatize what they say is the unfairness of the Democrats in blocking four of President Bush's judicial nominees.

The event featured some but not all of the features of marathon debates of bygone days -- cots outside the chamber for weary orators, for example, but no senators claiming they were equipped with personal plumbing devices to allow them to hold the floor at length without pause. While the procedures may have been civilized, the feelings were bitter; Republicans called the exercise an important and needed display of ''justice for judges'' while Democrats said it was a stunt and a preposterous waste of time.

Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, an assistant Republican leader and a principal architect of the session, told reporters, ''We'll work well into the night on Thursday night, and we will do what is best for this country and what is best for the Constitution to try to restore the tradition and precedent of the Senate to get up-or-down votes on judicial nominations for the sake of this country and for the sake of the independence of the judiciary.''

Republicans are angered that although they have 51 votes, a slim majority, they have not been able to get all of President Bush's judicial nominees confirmed. The Democrats have succeeded in blocking, so far, four of Mr. Bush's nominees to the federal appeals courts, the level just below the Supreme Court, while confirming 28 appeals court judges.

The four blocked judicial nominees are William Pryor Jr., of Alabama, nominated to the appeals court based in Atlanta; Charles W. Pickering and Priscilla R. Owen, nominated to the appeals court based in New Orleans; and Miguel Estrada, nominated to the appeals court based in Washington. Mr. Estrada has withdrawn his candidacy.

The Democrats have been able to block the four nominees, who they say are conservative ideologues outside the mainstream of legal thought, by threatening filibusters, extended debates. To break the filibusters, the Republicans need a three-fifths majority, or 60 votes. So far, they have succeeded in attracting only a few Democratic defectors.

Republican senators and President Bush have demanded a straight up-or-down vote. ''The only reason they won't allow an up-or-down vote on these people is that they know they would lose,'' said Senator Orrin G. Hatch, the Utah Republican who is the chairman of the Judiciary Committee. Mr. Hatch said what the Democrats were doing was ''downright dirty.''

The last of the old-time marathon filibusters occurred during the fight for the 1964 Civil Rights Act, said Richard Baker, the Senate historian. When the bill's supporters mustered enough votes to end the 57-day debate, Mr. Baker said, ''that broke the back of the all-night filibuster.''

But other debates have also gone long, as in 1994 when the Senate spent nearly 31 hours debating campaign finance reform. The session that began at 6 p.m. Wednesday is to conclude at midnight Thursday.

The Republican talk-a-thon is an especially odd parliamentary creature in that it is an extended debate to protest the Democrats' use of the filibuster, which in modern usage no longer involves extended debate. ''This is the anti-filibuster,'' Mr. Santorum said. Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, said, ''This is 'Alice in Wonderland' stuff.''

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In modern filibusters like the ones employed against the four Bush judicial nominees, the extended debate is merely threatened and not actually carried out.

Republicans have repeatedly asserted that using a filibuster to block a judicial nominee is unprecedented. History books and contemporary news accounts, however, generally depict Justice Abe Fortas's unsuccessful bid in 1968 to become chief justice to have been filibustered by Republicans.

Democrats say a handful of President Bill Clinton's appeals court nominees were blocked by Republican filibusters. Since under the modern, implicit filibuster, its existence becomes apparent only when there is an effort to end it, the Democrats point to votes taken to end a filibuster to prove their point. Republicans assert the so-called cloture votes were only procedural matters used to fine-tune the legislative calendar. In any event, all of those nominees were eventually confirmed.

It is, however, indisputable that there has been nothing quite like the current situation in which a handful of judicial nominees is simultaneously blocked by filibuster.

The Democrats prepared to endure the session without cots. ''It seems too melodramatic,'' said Senator Tom Daschle of South Dakota, the Democratic leader. When not on the floor they were, he said, in their offices, with the most senior members in their more cozy second offices in the Capitol building itself, called hideaways.

But the Republicans, candid about their interest in the dramatic and their hopes in getting attention for the session, had cots brought in Wednesday morning and invited the news media to witness the event. Whether any Republican senators actually plunk themselves down in the cots in the remote hours but for a brief photo opportunity is uncertain; they also have nice offices in which to spend the time.

Underlying the exercise is a rich political discussion mostly about what the Republicans hope to achieve. There is little expectation on either side that the 30 hours will change anything in the impasse.

Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois voiced the prevalent Democratic view, saying, ''This is all about grinding red meat for their conservative wing.'' Conservative activists have, in fact become increasingly vocal in their condemnation of the Republican caucus for not doing more on the judges issue.